


Wait a minute, mister postman

by PeriPeriwinkle



Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, M/M, Mutual Pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-07
Updated: 2016-12-07
Packaged: 2018-09-07 03:47:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,249
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8781742
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PeriPeriwinkle/pseuds/PeriPeriwinkle
Summary: Does Dorian, the very handsome man that Bull delivers things to nearly once every week, really likes online shopping? Or is it something else he likes very, very much?Bull bets it's the latter.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [cathybites](https://archiveofourown.org/users/cathybites/gifts).



At the top of the pile of letters on the office desk, Bull's eye catches a familiar name written neatly onto a simple envelope.

_Dorian-freaking-Pavus._

He shakes his head, grinning. At least once a week Dorian Pavus, the handsome, mustached man that lives right next to his house, orders something on the mail. _At least_. Bull doesn’t mind it, especially because he usually goes there at the end of the day on his way home, and the man doesn’t ever seem to mind the late deliveries. Not to mention that the man is a sight for sore eyes; if he didn't think it'd be highly inappropriate, he would've asked the man out already. Koslun knows he's had dozens of opportunities to do so at this point.

And, you know, some things, like the way Dorian stutters and fidgets whenever he tries to make small talk, or the way he always seem to be all dolled up whenever he answers the door to greet Bull, tells him that the man is more than just addicted to online shopping.

Bull chuckles, pockets the envelope, shoulders his mail bag, and goes out to start his day.

 

\---

 

When Bull closes his front door he sags heavily against it, because it was _that_ type of day.

The clock on his living room wall reads six-forty-five, which means that he’s only fifteen minutes overtime, but those fifteen minutes feels like two hours. He thumbs his left knee and grunts; he’s only thirty, but he’s still too old to run from angry dogs that their owners conveniently forgot to tell him were loose on the front garden, or to get an earful from people who think it was his fault their dog chewed up the mail he left on the mail port on their door.

He doesn’t spend too long thinking about it; instead he pushes himself away from the door, daydreaming about his warm shower, the leftovers waiting in his fridge, and to lie down on a fresh set of sheets while he still smells of soap. Therapeutic as fuck, and exactly what he needs.

He undresses without giving it much thought, leaving his pants and shirt on the bathroom floor as he makes his way to his shower, his blessedly warm and enormous shower. He sits down on the ledge, sighing as the water hits him from above, and lets himself enjoy this moment of peace for as long as it lasts.

He forces himself to close the tap about thirty minutes later, when the tip of his fingers are already well and wrinkled, and he’s just toweling himself off when he sees it.

Right there, thrown on the floor of his now-beyond-damp bathroom, peeking from the pocket of his work pants.

Dorian’s envelope.

Bull actually feels his blood run cold, the color drain from his face, his jaw go slack as he widens his single eye.

He has never, _ever_ not delivered a letter before.

Not even that one time when he fell on a fountain after a kid ran past him in skates and accidentally pushed him in. No, he went home, dried all of his letters, and personally delivered each and every single one of them with an apology message. Every. Single. Letter.

Panic. Bull makes sure his hands are dry, catches the letter, runs down the stairs, wincing at his knee. Once he’s at the bottom, he notices - he’s still just wearing his towel. Bull curses, turns around to go back up the stairs to change, and at once two things happen: one, his knee _pops_ , sending a wave of pure agony up his thigh and down to his ankle, and two, he gets a good look at the clock on his living room wall.

Seven-fifty-three.

_Shit._

So Bull limps his way to the laundry room instead and peeks inside his washing machine.

Of course the very last thing he washed were his blankets; of _fucking_ course. Winter is coming, after all, and the smell of his blankets after they’re kept inside his closet for a whole nine months make him sneeze, so yeah, he left those to wash in the morning while he was out working. Those, plus his purple plush dragon kigurumi.

He hasn’t brought his dirty laundry basket downstairs yet, so.

It's either the kigurumi or the towel.

Bull presses his lips together tightly, sighs deeply. Resigned, he reaches for the fluffy dragon tail and hopes for the best.

 

\---

 

When Dorian’s doorbell rings, he’s sitting on his couch with a glass of wine and a book he absolutely has to finish reading for his class in college. He thanks the Maker for an excuse to put the dreaded book down, drains what little is left on his glass, then considers whether or not he should put a shirt on.

Then he looks at the clock on his side table. Eight-oh-two in the evening. Much later than the usual socially acceptable time for visits. So he figures that whoever is here to see him will just have to deal with Dorian’s bare chest and his silk pajama pants, and maybe once they see how little fucks Dorian gives about his current appearance they’ll get the hint and leave him alone to drain his bottle of Antivan and go back to his book.

The very same book he so wants to throw inside his fireplace, but still.

So he places his glass down and walks to his front door, then prepares his most obnoxious annoyed face to greet whoever’s on the other side.

Except his face falls as soon as he sees exactly _who_ it is.

The Iron Bull, his neighborhood mailman, in all his glory, wearing what seems to be a surprisingly soft pair of purple pants, a matching purple-fluffy shirt tied around his waist, and a pair of flip flops.

And absolutely nothing else.

Dorian blames the fact that he’s salivating on the shitty Antivan wine, but he knows it’s bullshit the moment he first gulps and forces his eyes up and up _and up_ towards the qunari’s face instead of, say, his pectorals. Or his middle. Or his arms. Maker, _his arms_.

He wasn’t even _expecting_ him today. He hadn’t actually ordered anything the last week, because, well. Because he’d told himself he _wouldn’t_ the last time, when he stuttered around a laughable attempt of making conversation while the man was just trying to go back to his deliveries.

Who even tries to make conversation on the weirdly tiny size of someone’s _sack_? Honestly. Bull looked down, then back up, lifting his single brow, and Dorian blushed like a schoolgirl. Then he tried to correct himself by reassuring him he wasn’t talking about _that_ particular sack, but, you know, he’s _sure_ it’s a decently sized sack. Appropriately sized. Marvelously proportional. Which just earned him another impressive eyebrow lift as Bull pressed his lips together in an attempt not to burst out laughing.

It all just went downhill from there. It wasn’t one of Dorian’s best moments.

So although his finger itched to make another useless online purchase, he held himself back, if simply for the fact that he couldn't look Bull in the eye ever again. _Ever_. He’d even looked for houses far, far away from this area inside his price range.

All for naught. Because here he is now, looking Bull in the eye, because he thought it was better than staring down into the endless expanse of naked chest right in his eye level.

Dorian gulps again, mouth flapping open, and notices the letter in Bull’s hand.

“Hi,” Bull finally says once the silence stretches for too long, then reaches up with his free hand to scratch at the base of his right horn. “So, um. I’m so, _so_ sorry it’s so late, I know this is incredibly rude of me, to stop by at this hour. I _really_ don’t usually do this. But, uh. I completely forgot to deliver your letter. So, here. This is yours.”

He extends his hand forward, flapping the letter in the air. Dorian takes it and reads the sender’s name.

Felix Alexius.

...wait.

_Felix?_

Dorian opens the letter right away, momentarily ignoring Bull. From inside the envelope he pulls out a single, crude-looking postcard of a half naked hunk of a man doing a ridiculously exaggerated sexy pose, surrounded by clipart hearts of all shapes, colors and sizes. He widens his eye, then sees Felix’s handwriting in thick, black pen on the top right corner of the card.

**_Just ask him out already! XoXo ;D_ **

That _traitor_.

“Sorry if it’s, uh. A bit damp. I pocketed your letter and then forgot about it. And then left my pants in the bathroom floor  while I had a pretty long warm shower.”

The image of Bull having a _long, warm shower_ pops into Dorian’s mind for a fraction of a second, enough for his body to threaten giving him the most awkward boner of his life - while he’s wearing very loose, very thin silk pants.

Another thought pops up before anything happens though, and for that he will be ever grateful.

“You _pocketed_ my letter?”

“ _Oh_. Uh. Shit.” Bull mutters, fidgeting. “Yeah, I. Well. I did. I saw your name on it right before I started my shift, and I guess it was just automatic. ‘Cause I deliver stuff to you all the time. Also, you live right next to me, so.”

“I do?!” Dorian exclaims, widening his eyes, and Bull shrugs.

“Yeah, I live right there,” he points to the quaint little house next to Dorian’s, the one with the daisies up front and a spices garden on the back.

He wants to say he’s surprised, but really. Besides the fact that he’s a qunari, delivers his mail, and is as handsome as life itself, Dorian knows nothing about the man he’s been crushing for the past few months.

“Oh,” Dorian finally says, and again, silence falls over them.

A few more awkward seconds stretch as they look at each other, fidgeting in place, not really saying anything else. Bull eventually pops his lips together, pouts, and picks up a _plush dragon tail_ off the floor.

“Mmmmyeah. So I guess I’ll just... go back home. See you around, neighbor.”

“See you,” Dorian whispers, still stunned, and _Maker above_ , stares at Bull’s ridiculously chiseled back as he turns around and starts walking away.

The envelope in his hand crinkles as he fists his hand in frustration. He looks down, glances at Felix’s writing. _Ask him out_.

He looks back up, watches the man limping awkwardly, the dragon tail that’s apparently attached to the back of his pants clutched on his hand.

_Ask him out!_

“Wait!”

Bull stops and turns around. Dorian freezes.

He can almost _hear_ Felix groaning as he rolls his eyes.

**_Ask. Him. OUT!_ **

“I was just having a glass of red Antivan from the Blessed age and was about to order some food to go with it,” he blurts out, heart beating fast inside his chest. _Keep going, Pavus. You can do this_. “...Would you like to join me?”

Bull hesitates, then looks down at the tail he’s still holding on to.

“I’m literally wearing dragon pajama pants... and you’re inviting me in for dinner?”

Dorian shrugs, then leans against his doorframe, grinning. “Maybe I think it’s cute. Kinda like you.”

 _Maker, what a crap line_. Dorian holds back the cringe he feels coming, pretends the line was smooth as a baby’s buttcheek. _Fake it ‘til you make it_ , as Sera always says.

Surprisingly, it has more or less the intended effect. Bull burst out laughing, shakes his head, then turns around.

“Wine and food sounds great,” he says, and Dorian steps out of the way to let him in, closing the door behind him in complete shock.

He’s going to kiss Felix tomorrow. Right in the fucking mouth.

 

\---

 

When Bull walked out of his house, limping, tying the top of his kigurumi around his waist and carrying the dragon tail under his arm so it wouldn’t drag behind him on the floor, he felt silly beyond imagination. A mess. An absolutely ridiculous sight.

When Dorian opened the door, revealing a wide, naked chest dusted with black hair and arms and abs much more toned than he’d expect, he was flabbergasted beyond words. The man just jumped from handsome to jaw-dropping gorgeous in the blink of an eye.

And now, much to his surprise, he’s inside Dorian’s house, the fireplace in the living room already down to embers, sharing pasta and one of the best wines he’s ever had as they talk and laugh quite easily to each other. Absolutely not how he expected to spend his evening, but it’s a more than welcome change. He feels like that exhausting day he’s just had is now ages beyond him.

From beneath the table, Dorian’s toes finds Bull’s ankle. He looks up from where he’s scraping the plate, eyes wide, and sees that Dorian is leaning back on his chair, wine glass in hand, chest still bare, a sly grin curling his lips up.

The toes slide even further up, pushing the hem of his pajama pants with it.

“So, mailman. How about we take this upstairs, and I’ll show you what’s inside _my_ sack?”

Bull burst out laughing so hard he chokes on his own spit.

They do eventually manage to get upstairs though, and Bull thinks to himself, _man_.

_I’m so glad I pocketed that letter._

**Author's Note:**

> This is a treat I wrote for [cathybites](http://archiveofourown.org/users/cathybites/profile), just because I liked their prompt:
> 
> "Dorian shops online a lot. A LOT. Mostly because he likes to, but also maaaaybe because the delivery guy for his neighborhood is a ridiculously large and handsome Qunari."
> 
> I think it went a little sideways from the original, but I had fun writing this, and I hope you like it! :D happy holidays!


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